Government Still Seeking for Competitive OTT

Ilustrasi (dok)

JAKARTA (IndoTelko) - The government is apparently have not have a local OTT (Over The Top) that will be prepared to face the foreign dominance in the applications competition.

Based on the government initiated discourse since June 2015, it is still under discussion among the Ministry of Communications and Informatics (Kemenkominfo) and the Association of Telecommunication of Indonesia (ATSI) for selecting the right local OTT to be an equal competition against the foreign players.

"For the local OTT issue will we exaggerated on that, it is being discussed together with ATSI. This is not an easy affair boss. There are criteria," said Minister of Communication and Informatics Rudiantara.

Rudiantara said that ATSI supports the government's plan, but was making criteria for local OTT that are considered to be able to go head to head and resist the invasion of foreign domination.

"Now, ATSI is talking to the local development and the selection criteria. The selection criteria are not easy. From the local termination, and a lot of unclear variables," Rudiantara said.

ATSI chairman Alexander Rusli said that the local OTT will be announced later to be were invited to cooperate and supported by the operator. "Initially, there were three or four local OTT. We are prioritizing on instant messaging and social media," he said.

Just to note, pre-installed local applications is one of the component that will be counted for domestic content level (DCL) regulation on a 4G smartphone products.

DCL for 4G smartphones will be divided into two, namely infrastructure and handsets. The DCL determination will be set by the rapid advancement of the 4G ecosystem.

Implementation of DCL could contribute significantly to savings because the components that had to be imported, can now be replaced by domestic products. If this policy has been effective, there are import cost savings of up to US $ 5 billion which is certainly a very significant effect on foreign exchange. (es)